Earlier in February this year, Google officially revealed Android for Work – a profile (for Lollipop users) or app (for Ice Cream Sandwich to KitKat users) designed to integrate enterprise and business functions into an employee’s private Android phone.
Yesterday saw Google release the official Android for Work app on the Play Store, which allows Android users to keep two copies of the same app – one for work, and the other for personal use.
Android for Work, while an app, functions directly as a software suite through which employees can access corporate files, documents, or other data on their mobile phone. The app achieves this but keeping a specific “Work” version of traditional Google mainstays: contacts, Docs, or Chrome, for instance.
Through the “Work” app, employees can securely attend to corporate business while keeping their work and private personas and files independent of one another. To exemplify, this means that Docs and Chrome search history used within Android for Work will not appear within the private versions of Docs or Chrome that a user may keep on their Android device.
Presently, Google has established partnerships with Cisco, BlackBerry, Motorola, Samsung, and Box – amongst others – to release its work apps. Companies interested in deploying Android for Work will need to proceed through a setup phase, which requires a central administration.
The suite first arrived on Android 5.0 Lollipop, as a profile which users could switch between a private and work persona and keep personal and corporate files separate.
With Android for Work, Google not only goes head-to-head with office giants BlackBerry and Microsoft, but also directly competes with Apple’s new partnership with IBM, which intends to supplement the iPhone and iPad‘s role in enterprise.
Have you used Android for Work? Let us know in the comments below!
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